Frost moved into the flames, walking past the corpses of the Anids as went to retrieve her bullet. A giant ball made from the curling of ten spider-like fingers was half-buried into the soul. The pallid eye that once resided within popped like a balloon, its membrane coiling in response to the heat.

The Pentanids were not spared either.

They crumbled away the moment the Decanid perished. They were the first to reduce to ashes, revealing red blood within before the flames burned away the blue strings that originated from an unknown origin.

“Level 80 in only one hit. If I remember correctly a Decanid has around 15,000 HP. I don’t think I put that much strength into it shot. But looking at you, you probably didn’t recover from your fight with the previous Decanid. Good riddance. And here I thought leaving the old one was a mistake…”

Claw marks matching the claws of the Pentanids ran along the body of the Decanid. The previous one didn’t go down without a fight.

“Haaaah. In the end you’re slaves to instinct and hunger. What was the point being sentient if you can’t even make your own choices?”

Since there was no other reason to remain here, she made her way back to the others with a small, pleasant smile now that the Anids were exterminated for good.

But unbeknownst to her, that calm smile was like the grin of a demon to the survivors.

A pair of ominous, golden orbs emerged from the fog from their point of view, followed by her immaculate form.

“Alright.” She reached down to offer a hand to the apprentice mage. “Hey! Sorry about the explosion. They got under my skin, so I just wanted to teach them a lesson. Are you ok?”

Hopefully this doesn’t scare them too much.

“You’re in full pendulum mode now Frost.”

As in?

“Are you daft? One second you’re at their throats, and the next you present yourself as a saint.”

“W-We’re…” The apprentice looked around. The world was blackened by the flames, and by some miracle, they were left unscathed. “… Fine now. Thanks to you. I can’t even move my legs… Shit. We really… should’ve died just now.”

“But you didn’t. That’s what matters the most right now.” Her words were spoken casually, but they meant everything to girl who finally found the courage to stand. “By the way, I hope you didn’t forget about our deal.”

“Directions? I can… Hold on… One moment… I’m sorry Agh… It’s… hard to breathe all of a sudden.”

Her complexion went pale as she struggled to speak. She was on guard against Frost all of a sudden, averting direct eye contact at all costs.

“Here. Sit down. Take deep breaths. You all should too.”

A panic attack immediately swooped in from out of the blue. The girl was visibly traumatized by the ordeal to the point where Frost couldn’t leave her alone.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

“I thought this was a common sight in Grandis?”

“It is… We’ve all seen worse than this. Normally you just… you just die.” She panted as Frost rubbed her back pleasantly to help calm her down. “It’s… getting better. T-Thank you again. I just thought you were going to bleed the answers out of me. That’s why I’m all shaky.”

“We made a deal though?”

“High Ranking people like you don’t often get the shortest straws like we do. It’s normal for stronger people to get more than what they agreed on. S-So – Um… Information! Directions! What do you need to know!”

The girl’s crimson eyes began sparkling all of a sudden as she looked… down at the shorter Frost.

“Let’s see. I’m looking for a city called Frontier.”

“I thought you were from the Bellum Empire? Are you actually from the North?” The girl tilted her head, her long, wavy, autumn hair tumbling to one side.

“Yeah. I’m from the North.” Frost played along.

“That explains the giant stick you have up there… J-Just Frontier? So you want to go to the Capital of the Bellum Empire.”

The girl began drawing on the floor with broken plank.

“Bell… Um… Emp… Pire… To the West.” She said, drawing a make-shift map for the moment since her map was burned up during the blaze.

“Oh, wait – before that, I’m also heading to Paradise.” Frost nearly forgot to include the most important part, causing the merchants to stare at her like she was a lunatic.

“… Ah. Yes. I see. Paradise. Let me just… Wait, HUH!?” The girl finally reacted, messing up her drawing completely. “P-Please. That’s not even funny if it’s coming from our savior!”

“Did I say something wrong?” Frost blankly blinked, wondering if the reason why they reacted so violently was because they thought that Frost still believed Paradise existed.

Or…

Is it because there’s something going on there? We all know the lands belonging to the Kingdom of Puritas are pretty much sterile. Could have a Corrupted claimed it as its home?

“Why do you sound so happy about that?”

Because if we end up finding another Main Sequence Corrupted there then we’ll be saving so much time.

“Wrong? Are you seriously considering it? That place is so lawless that it makes Grandis look like a joke! But… maybe you’ll fit in well? Don’t tell me, you’re actually a murderer!?”

“Do I look like the kind of person that would kill someone on a whim?” Frost sighed as the same merchant she threatened to off trembled. “Besides, I just asked for information not your concern. So, do you know where I need to go to find these places? I know Paradise is south. That much I know.”

“So why did you ask?” Was written on the girl’s face. “Aquagale Solitude. That’s the city we’re heading to now. We have a Patron of the Highway Branch located there, so if it’s not a bother then I can give you one of our maps as payment for saving us. Does that count?”

What she offered was far better than oral information. If the Triplets’ maps weren’t so outdated, then she wouldn’t have needed to take this route in the first place.

“Much better than what I was expecting. Alright~”

It also didn’t help that the ban on Brandar extended to the Beholders too so there was quite literally no one in the Nexus who had access to a map of Grandis. Frost considered consulting Hellen, but she figured that she needed some more time to be alone with Alice.

She had heard that Hellen was utterly distraught during Alice’s disappearance.

So Frost had to ask Nav a question as the others futility scavenged what was left of their belongings from the ashes.

Nav. Why did everyone’s map of Grandis disappear?

“Your guess is as good as mine. Whatever it was, Iscario may have played a part in it. It would have significantly slowed down any advances into Grandis.”

A war of information, huh. I remember a story from Earth. Well, not a story since it actually happened. A country sent their forces to invade the shores of another thinking it was all flat. Little did they know that the terrain had changed since then, and huge hill was there. You can imagine the carnage that a whole line of machine guns was able to cause…

… I’m getting off the rails, but you get what I mean. Of course sending the Triplets was a good idea. They’re residents of Grandis. But that was thirty years ago too. Haaaah…

“You’re curious too. About what we may find here.”

Yep. And we’re already off to a good start.